Before I Forget

My paternal great-grand aunt, daughter of Ben Abshier and Carmelite Boulet, was born in Chambers County, Texas in 1847. My Wiser cousins may know her as an older sister to our Sylvina Abshier Wiser.  

Known as "Bettie," Elizabeth married Daniel Ainsworth July 3, 1865. 

Dan had only recently returned home from the Civil War when the couple married. In 1862 the 25 year old Dan had enlisted in the Confederate States Army in Liberty County, Texas. He served four years as a private with Company F, 2d Battalion Waul's Legion, Texas Infantry. He reportedly saw several battles. 

He was injured from a bomb sometime between May and July of 1863 during the siege of Vicksburg, Mississippi. Read about it in his 1899 application for military pension:

[Six pages in the above gallery]

Bettie Ainsworth was approved for a pension. See what amount she received each year until her death in 1912. That is an annual payment--not monthly. 

https://www.tsl.texas.gov/arc/pensions/amounts.html


By the way, it was 158 years ago tomorrow that Daniel Ainsworth entlisted in the Texas Infantry. I wonder what stories he might have told about the War. 

As mentioned a time (or 12)  before, my elusive paternal 2xGGrandmother Hannah is high on my search list. As a single mom with young boys in a new land, she somehow met and married a veteran of the early Texas battles for independence.

Sam Leeper was good enough to become guardian of her sons, and for that I am grateful. Gosh, I am downright fond of this old soldier! I've enjoyed learning his history as an early pioneer to "Baja Oklahoma" (Texas), his three marriages, and trailing his children (whom he never saw again after leaving Virginia to fight the Mexican Army).

Today was a lucky one, as I found a few gems. From March 6, 1836 is a roster of soldiers who served under Captain Hayden Arnold. Just four days before, an activist group had formally declared their independence from Mexico. Throw down! 

These "Nacogdoches Volunteers" would soon fight in the famed Battle of San Jacinto on April 21, 1836. Samuel's name is fifth on the list: 

From April 27, 1838, his signature regarding real estate with a Mr. Henry Trott.  Sam's actual signature! 

Traces of Texas, a Facebook group I enjoy, shared this excerpt from author James H. Cook in his book: "50 Years on the Old Frontier," 1923.

"I had succeeded in transplanting myself from a state [Michigan, about 1875] where the people .... good citizens who loved God and nature ----- had accepted and, as a rule, lived up to the Ten Commandments; where, when trouble arose between men, it seldom was carried to a point beyond a fist fight. But in the section of Texas I had now entered, different conditions and codes prevailed. The War of Rebellion [Civil War] then so recent, had caused numerous men who had survived it and who had committed all sorts of desperate crimes, to seek refuge in the wilds of the land of chapparal and cactus, where the strong arm of the law seldom entered, and where, when it did, the refugee would be apt to have the best of it. A majority of the ranchmen in the country preferred aiding a white refugee to helping bring him to justice. The preference sprang from a motive of self-protection, for the enmity of such characters was a most dangerous thing. As there was in that section but little employment other than working with stock, naturally these men took up the life of the cowboy ---- when their time was not occupied dodging State Rangers or robbing stages and small settlements. Almost every dispute had to be settled with a gun-or-knife fight or else assassination. Such people, added to thieving bands of Mexicans and Indians, wild beasts of many sorts, and other terrors such as centipedes, tarantulas, and rattlesnakes, were a help in making life interesting ...

I did not let anyone know where I hailed from. A 'blue-bellied Yankee,' even if he were but a boy, was about the most unpopular thing in Texas at that period. With many people, anyone who came from the country lying to the north of the Red River was a Yankee."

• Fort Worth gazette. (Fort Worth, Tex.), 26 April 1891. Chronicling America: Historic American Newspapers. Lib. of Congress. 
  http://chroniclingamerica.loc.gov/lccn/sn86071158/1891-04-26/ed-1/seq-16/
  
  

          While in search of ancestors in newspaper archives, I found this chilling tidbit from a 1922 southeast Texas paper. Apparently an editor was still nursing his anger over losing our nation's bloodiest war. 

http://www.foxnews.com/story/2005/06/13/senate-apologizes-for-not-passing-anti-lynching-laws.html

          Really? From 1882 to 1968, "nearly 200 anti-lynching bills were introduced in Congress, and three passed the House. Seven presidents between 1890 and 1952 petitioned Congress to pass a federal law."  

          I firmly believe that laws are not a deterrent to criminal behavior. But laws sure as hell aid prosecutors when seeking to press charges and to later convince juries to give  l  o  n  g  lengthy sentences to those found guilty.

          So no, Mr. Editor from a town called Liberty. Your right to murder by (white) cloak of darkness or by public hanging was not deemed unlawful in 1922, as you had earlier feared. 


FEBRUARY 2020 UPDATE:  Were S L O W L Y  making progress, folks, towards a federal law against lynching, FFS:

Between 1877 and 1950, the Equal Justice Initiative estimates that more than 4,000 black people were lynched in a dozen states: Alabama, Arkansas, Florida, Georgia, Kentucky, Louisiana, Mississippi, North Carolina, South Carolina, Tennessee, Texas and Virginia.

The bill, the Emmett Till Antilynching Act, was written after the 1955 racist murder of a black teenager in Mississippi, which spawned civil rights action."